What's up with 2257?

Hey folks,

My husband just asked me what's happening with the 2257 laws and inspections these days. I then realized I'd lost track what's happening with the law. Last I heard (under the Bush administration) the inspections were on-again, off-again things that were almost random in implementation. And there was at least one challenge to some of the 2257 aspects in court, but it was taking forever.

Anything ever come of all this? On GayGeek we don't post explicit pictures specifically because of the secondary producer requirements to maintain IDs. I'd sure love to be able to post 'em though if it were legal to do so.

Anyone know what's been going on?

--Aaron

http://business.avn.com/articles/372...gn=top_story_3

Great link to that article.

I will be waiting to hear how this turns out.

Yah, thanks for the link.

In short:

- Government has a motion to dismiss
- Hearing on the issue to be held in March (the 18th? Don't recall exactly)
- Trial set to be held later this year.

I was really pleased to see that article. I didn't realize that there is still a possibility that debate will continue on the secondary producer requirements of the 2257 regulations.

I was doing small AVS sites from home and while I did keep the records, I simply do not have the time to devote to compliance on a larger scale that would be necessary if I wanted to continue putting content on the web. I wasn't making tons of money anyway.

But if the secondary producer requirements are modified or eliminated then I could continue the work as a hobby and simply point to the custodian of records of the content providers.

I wouldn't hold my breath. 2257A (Adam Walsh Act) was signed into law quite a while ago, and the language in it was written specifically to undo Sundance vs Reno and the other vagueness about requirements for secondary producers.

There's no question that secondary producers mush maintain records now (of models, not the names of the primary producers). That's been the case since aobut January 16th of '09.

we carry 2257's for everything. if we dont have 2257 for anything, we dont use it anymore even as a secondary producer.

Hi Chip.

I know that secondary producers are required currently to maintain records and I do not argue that. I also have been keeping records for any content that I have placed on the web. I buy from content providers who provide these records.

But I do not know if you read the article that was linked to earlier in this thread. It seems they are going to go in and argue the validity of the regulations again. It is certainly an interesting prospect.

Nobody should stop keeping records in anticipation of any outcome of this case.

To me, this seems like it would make things harder instead of easier.

"Plaintiffs go on to note that there has been only one "well-publicized instance of an underage performer appearing in an adult film": Traci Lords, who used "a sophisticated ruse employing artifice and fraud which would not have been prevented by the most punctilious compliance with either 18 U.S.C. §2257 or 18 U.S.C. §2257A." Indeed, neither statute requires that adult producers actually be able to distinguish a real photo ID presented by a performer from a well-crafted fake, thereby rendering both statutes ineffective in preventing minors from acting in adult productions."

If that's the argument, we'll be required to have one of those machines connect to the governments database that clubs use to scan IDs and they'll say "There, we fixed the problems."

Well actually there are a ton of reasons why 2257 makes no sense. For one thing, there's absolutely nothing to provide a fix on *when* content was shot, and there are accusations abounding that various studios have shot models at age 17, then faked the production date and released it after they turned 18. Nothing in current requirements would prevent this from happening.

For another, there are some really good fake IDs out there.

And for yet another, there's the problem of a younger model borrowing his older brother's ID if they look somewhat similar, so in that case, you don't even have an ID of the person you shot at all.

And from 2005 until the regulations for the Adam Walsh Act passed, "Production Date" was interpreted by Justice to include the date that the content was assembled. So, for example, a DVD assembled and authored in 2009 with content shot in 1997 could legally have a production date of 2009 on it -- further rendering 2257 useless. Fortunately they fixed that with 2257A.

But I did read the article, and while I would like to be optimistic, I just can't see any appellate justices, and certainly not the Supremes, shooting down 2257 on the basis of the arguments being made, especially since the thing was litigated and argued, with some of these same arguments, from 1990 until 1995.